Then choose the Bush-Bottle 1000, capable of holding 1000ml of pure refreshment and endorsed by various wilderness gurus!

Not just trendy, also environmentally friendly?

Too Good to be True?

Not everything in bushcraft needs to be expensive - something of a shock for the growing bushcraft business bandwagon. Very effective tools can be made, modified or obtained very cheaply and in an environentally beneficial way.

First, Catch your Bottle

First you need to find a bottle. It needs to be with a wide mouth to make it easier to fill up. If you are going to fill a bottle with snow then a wider bottle top is a must. The next thing to look for is the type of plastic - we need a clear PET plastic bottle. Clear is good because you can see how much is in it and for another reason - SODIS. A 1 litre bottle is a good size, not too big and not too heavy when full.

Clean and Pure

SODIS is short for Solar Disinfection. By exposing a clear PET bottle of water to sunlight for 6 hours then the UV light will kill off the bad bugs and bacteria in the water. The battle needs to be placed horizontally, ideally on a reflective surface and must be in a bottle of less than 3 litres capacity in order for the UV waves to penetrate fully. This method is effective in sunlight so better in summer. The water needs to be of low turbidity i.e. not full of bits and cloudy for the same reason. Water can be boiled in the bottle on a fire, in order to avoid melting the bottle the flames need to be kept low, below the water level. Check out a video on the subject.

String Sling

To make filling the bottle and carrying it a little easier I've added a sling to mine, a handle sling around the neck and the bottle to help dip the bottle and I've also added a loop with a pile hitch a bit further down. They're just in garden string and I'll experiment with which one works best.

Drum Roll

So here it is, the Bush-Bottle 1000, this one's still got the milk in it, but after you use it and wash the bottle out then you're ready to go. Not quite as flashy as a $400 backpack or knife but it'll do its job., and when it's too old and scratched just put it in the recycle bin and go back for another one.